Finding Real
by EclipseIsMyLifeNoMore
Summary: Peeta's view from after the first Game to the end. MAJOR PLOT SPOILERS! All characters and dialogue belongs to Suzanne Collins. R & R. T for violence


Ok so I've become seriously obsessed with the Hunger Games Trilogy and I've been seeing these Peeta POV fics pop up and the plot bunnies attacked with this one. So this one spans from after the first Game to the end of Mockingjay and it contains SERIOUS PLOT SPOILERS. Read the books and then read this, because you will go insane if you read this, ruin parts of the books and miss out on the rest. I used some direct quotes from the books so know that all the dialogue belongs to Suzanne Collins. Enjoy and R & R.

-Eclipse

Peeta's POV

I couldn't believe it, but I had to. Part of me—all of me, really—refused to give into the idea that she had just been playing. Everything was a lie but my feelings for her. I had loved her for so long and now, just when I thought our lives were finally going to go back to normal, well as normal as two victor's lives could be, she tells me that we can stop pretending. What if I don't want to stop loving her? What if I want to live the lie, to pretend that she loves me back, to pretend that we'll be in love forever and get married and have kids and die old and together. I prefer the lie to the truth. I wonder if she loves Gale the way I love her. Obviously she couldn't if she kissed me in the arena. If Katniss hadn't been reaped and Haymitch had wanted to do the star-crossed lovers bit with someone else, I would have refused. I would have admitted to her on national television that I had been in love with her since I was 5 years old. It would have been selfish and thoughtless, putting her through the paparazzi's questions and the attention she would have surely gotten but I would've wanted her to know, in case I didn't make it out alive. I probably would've won though, just so I could go back and find out if she could love me back. But this is how it ends instead. She fakes emotions so we don't piss off the Capitol and I fake the smiles, silently squelching hope that makes an appearance whenever she shows any affection towards me, however forced it may be.

So when she asks me to marry her so we don't get on Snow's bad side, I decide that if the lie is all I'm going to get, than I will live the lie, but only to protect her. Because regardless of how she feels, I'm still in love with her and I would still die for her. I only wish that she would be happy this way, because I hate seeing her so...dead. I've seen her talking with Gale and she doesn't smile much, but she has this brilliant light in her eyes that makes you stop and stare. Did this game of pretend take that light away? Did I do that to her? Suddenly, I realize that I hate the Games. At first, I thought I was lucky because I got to spend time with Katniss and tell her how I felt, even though I cursed myself for waiting until we were in mortal danger to do so. But because I was a coward and waited until the Games, the light in her eyes is gone. I have put her in more danger and I have trapped her with me for the rest of our lives. She will never love me now because she will hate me for what I have done, in a fit of selfish desire to let her know how much I love her. I used to think I'd die from my unknown love for her, but now I know I will die because she is slowly dying. She is being suffocated from the pressure of playing pretend. And it is all my fault. I am killing the girl I love and I cannot stop because doing so would probably kill her for real. So I have to keep up the game too. I would love nothing more than to go far away and just live by myself, away from the gaze she has, the look that doesn't mean to blame me but does so anyway, the blink of the eyes that reveals that she is exhausted from doing all of this, the almost silent sigh that says how much she wishes she had died in the arena.

When I discover she is going back into the arena, for a moment, I see blood. How could they do that? Don't they understand that I can't live without her? The morning after she gets drunk with Haymitch, I become furious. I see that spark of life and with ice cold realization, I know that the glimmer of hope is because she can allow herself to die in the arena and she can finally escape her personal hell and she can give me a chance at living. She cannot die because I have sworn to keep her alive. But she has sworn that I cannot die either so we are at a impasse. Would I be selfish enough to spin more lies that force the Capitol to keep her alive, just so I can die, knowing she is safe? But if I died, who would be able to protect her? Gale? Maybe we'll both die together anyway. Obviously it's the Capitol's intention that she dies so why not make up a story that would turn all of Panem against the Games that started all of this? Suddenly it comes to me and I don't tell Katniss because I know her reaction will be perfect. We'll convince the nation that she is pregnant. And with that, the Capitol will have to keep us alive because if Katniss dies, Panem will rail against Snow and if I die, Panem will fight to keep Katniss alive because their hero—and her imaginary child—deserve some kind of happy ending. Either way she lives and I have fulfilled my promise. But that's not how it goes. We're in the arena and I'm desperately trying to reach her because we're coming to the end of the Games and I cannot let her die when she is so close to living. I see a glimpse of her shooting an arrow and then the world explodes.

I wake up and I am in a cell, wounds gone. I have an interview with Caesar Flickerman and I'm angry that he suggests that Katniss, _my_ Katniss could have something to do with something so big. She promised to never keep things from me, so I would've known. After it is over, I am taken to a cell and I fall asleep quickly, exhausted by my outburst and my worries about Katniss. The next time I wake up, my memory is incredibly hazy. I can only remember things that don't have to do with someone. I can't remember her name. I can only remember that she has a braid and a mockingjay pin. A Peacekeeper comes in and starts asking questions about a rebellion I know nothing about. I do know that there was a rebellion in District 8 but since we're really not supposed to know about that, I don't say anything. But he beats me anyway, beats me for nothing. I see Lavinia and Darius the pair of Avoxes and I hear them torture Darius after Lavinia is electrocuted and killed. He can't speak and I can't stand to watch them mercilessly hurt him and finally I am given a dose of sleep syrup. When I wake up again, it's like nothing happened. I am healed again but the guard is back and he has a television with him. He forces me to watch a tape of Katniss and I and she has just dropped a tracker jacker nest on me and the Careers. A pain shoots through me and I'm now confused. She loves me but she tries to kill me. We continue with different tapes and my memory becomes clearer. She is evil. They have taken her and made her into a mutt. I have an interview with President Snow and he asks me to say something to Katniss and I do.

"Katniss...how do you think this will end? What will be left? No one is safe. Not in the Capitol. Not in the districts." I want to say something else, something to let her know that I hate her but something else comes out instead. "And you...in Thirteen..." I struggle to breathe, knowing that this is bad, I shouldn't be giving her a warning. Warnings are given to people you like and I hate Katniss. But I still continue. "Dead by morning." And just like that I hear her voice singing in my head and the beating that follows is worth it. Time passes and I come to hate Katniss. I hate that I gave her a warning and that she still lives. But Snow forgives my lapse and lets me get "rescued" by the rebels so I can kill Katniss. I am brought to their hospital and soon I see Katniss. She runs towards me and I see my chance. I lock my fingers around her throat, so close to ending her miserable life. But I am knocked out and I become a prisoner. And they try to reverse my attitude towards her because they can't have me killing the symbol of their rebellion. I start to remember things about Katniss, things like her father singing the Hanging Tree song and I am confused. I don't know which memories are real and which aren't. Did she try to kill me or did she try to save me? Did she drug me to save me or did she try to kill me with the needle? We talk once after Annie and Finnick's wedding and I can see that she doesn't trust me or like me. We're both crazy and yet she's...Katniss. I admire the way she holds herself, trying to be an icon and failing miserably. She tries and fails. And yet it makes me upset to see the way her jaw tightens and she flees.

And when she just gives up in a way after I join her on a mission, it makes me not want to hurt her. I have a brief conversation with her and I find out that she still thinks of me as an ally. And my favorite color is orange, like the sunset. But later, I try to kill her in a burst of crazed anger brought on my Boggs' death. I eventually pass out in the closet they have shoved me into and I wake up handcuffed and lying on a couch while the others discuss the next move. I want them to kill me but they refuse and I just wish I could die instead of killing other people. In a fit of confusion, I hand Katniss a container of Lamb Stew I find, somehow knowing she likes it. She returns the favor later and gives me a can of chicken and rice soup which I eat quickly and then she does something unexpected. She touches my forehead as she brushes my hair back. I freeze but I don't feel disgusted. I feel...different.

"You're still trying to protect me. Real or not real." I manage and she answers in a solemn voice.

"Real. Because that's what you and I do. Protect each other." I digest this as I fall asleep, trying to sort out the lies from the truth. When we hear the hissing of her name the next morning, I urge her to go, knowing that wherever that noise is, is something waiting to kill her. And I feel myself slipping, wanting to kill her. I try to bring myself back by digging my wrists into the metal of the handcuffs but it's useless. I tell her to leave me so I don't kill her but she begs me to keep going and what seems like a final act, kisses me hard. I start to shake and the nightmares come in full force, paralyzing me.

"Stay with me." she says and the memory of me sitting on her bed as she fights sleep fills my mind. I say the first thing that comes to my mind and I come back from the not real.

"Always." After more fighting, we stop in a safe place and she fixes my wrists and I remember more. But I suddenly feel tired and I drift off. A day passes and I talk with Gale and find out that Katniss does really love me. But I'm not entirely convinced and I don't really think that she would choose me if she had to.

When the Capitol explodes, I am reminded of the second Game. I was trying to reach Katniss and fire stopped me. I wake up in the burn unit and don't see Katniss until we are called into a meeting to discuss another Hunger Games with Capitol children. I vote no and when it is tied, Katniss votes yes and my heart drops. We are both damaged but I wish she wasn't so hurt. I had a fleeting urge to hug her and take the pain away.

I still don't know how I feel about her when she shoots President Coin and then tries to kill herself but her words remind me of my vow so long ago. _"Because that's what you and I do. Protect each other." _I run towards her and she bites my hand as I cover the pill, preventing her death. As she tries to get away from me, the pill falls to the floor and she is taken away. Weeks pass and I think I miss her. Her trial comes and goes and I think I am relieved that she is let go. I am already at my house in the Victor's Village in 12 and a few months pass and I still don't see her. I don't even know if she's back yet. Greasy Sae is there so I think she must be there too. I go back to the bakery and work there from time to time when I can handle it.

I'm walking home when I see a primrose growing on the edge of the fence. I run into the forest and get 5 bushes of them and start planting them outside her window early one spring morning. She hears me and she runs to the side of the house and asks me what I'm doing. When I tell her, her eyes narrow for a second before she nods and then runs back inside. I hear something breaking and I smell something burning but the door is locked. The next day, I come with Greasy Sae and a loaf of bread and she eats breakfast with me and she feeds her bacon Prim's cat that I thought she hated. We make a book of good memories and soon I fall in love with her again. And she says that she loves me too. And this time I know it's real.


End file.
